Birth order

“ The civil code of France has placed a limit to our credulity respecting retarded births, and decrees three hundred days, or ten months, to be the most distant period at which the legitimacy of a birth shall be allowed. ”

“ As used in this section, the term "unborn children" or "unborn child" shall include all unborn child [sic] or children or the offspring of human beings from the moment of conception until birth at every stage of biological development. ”

“ Physicians claim that early marriage with knowledge to control birth would do away with both. For this would enable two young people to live and work together until such time as they could care for a family. ”

“ A baby is born to us. The law says that the child's birth must be registered within a few weeks, if it be born in wedlock; if born out of wedlock, its birth must be notified within three days. Why? To safeguard the new life, and in the case of the poor little "unwanted" mites, to prevent baby farming and infanticide. A marriage is to take place. ”

“ Evidence of paternity, in case of the father disowning the child, is to be established according to the form prescribed in Sections 140–144.
140. An unmarried woman who becomes pregnant shall give notice not later than three months before the birth of the child to the local Bureau of Vital Statistics of her place of residence, stating the time of conception, the name and residence of the father. ”

“ The general subject of Birth Control necessarily includes the special subject of Birth Control Methods, viz., of the methods of association between husband and wife under which offspring is conceived only at such times as desired, and consequently only in the number desired. ”

“ The only plausible explanation for this apparent excess is that a large number of female births are not reported to the authorities by the midwives and rabbis, who are expected to register each birth. ”

“ Only women were allowed to be present at a birth, at which they spread the knowledge of midwifery. As usual, many women died giving birth. Various ways to prevent pregnancy were tried. It was believed that a baby grew from a seed of the father planted in the woman's body. ”

“ It must be borne in mind that, although live-birth cannot be affirmed in the absence of signs of respiration, the presence of these signs is not proof of live-birth in the legal sense of the term. The law demands for live-birth a separate existence of the child after delivery ”

“ The Government supervises and warmly supports 409the work of this Society and also aids by enforcing the most perfect system of birth registration in the world, without which the results of the work could not be accurately gauged. ”

“ A Wrong to the Mother and Child.—Sometimes the mother is diseased; the outlet from the womb, as a result of laceration by a previous child-birth, is frequently enlarged, thus allowing conception to take place very readily, and hence she has children in rapid succession. ”

“ Young women of mature years should be made familiar with the physiological conditions which attend conception and maternity, and they need to know that from the [Pg 172] moment of conception life exists in the embryo, and that from the moment the spermatozoön enters and assimilates with the ovum a separate individual life is really begun, and that she is, at that very moment, the mother of this life within her as truly as when, in the later months, she feels the quickening within her, or after its birth experiences the joy of a mother who clasps her newborn infant in her arms. ”

“ Examples are related of children being born after ten full months of gestation; but these cases are very doubtful, for it is extremely difficult to know the exact period of conception. The legislation in France, however, has fixed the principle, that child-birth may take place up to the two hundred and ninety-ninth day of pregnancy.
Nothing is more curious than the mechanism by which the fœtus is expelled; everything happens with wonderful precision; all seems to have been foreseen, and calculated to favor its passage through the pelvis and the genital parts. ”

“ And when we consider those phases and forms of Birth Control which are concerned with Pre-Natal Culture—the culture of the child before its birth—can one, even though he be intensely prejudiced against Birth Control, assert that there is to be found here anything which in any way whatsoever can be considered as relating to the theory or practice of abortion? ”

“ In general, in any country where we find a diminished prolificity a falling off of childbirth unaccompanied by a decrease in the number of marriages occurring at the reproductive ages, we may attribute this decrease to voluntary restriction of childbearing on the part of the married, or in other words, to the prevalence of "birth control." ”

“ This life-form, thus started, grows according to the laws of its becoming more and more, until, at the expiration of a fixed period, which varies greatly in different animals, it becomes a complete young individual, of the nature and kind of its parents. The fertilization of the ovum in the female is called conception; its growing state is called gestation, and its birth, on becoming a separate being, is called parturition. In its growing condition, and before its birth, the new young life form is known as the foetus. ”

“ The advocates of rational and scientific Birth Control have presented the strongest points of their case in their replies to those opposing the general idea, and without positively taking the stand that the burden of the proof in the argument concerning Birth Control rested upon those opposing the idea, have practically assumed that position. ”

“ How often should childbirth take place? It is most important that the childbearing wife and mother have a long period of rest between births. At least one year should separate a birth and the conception following it. ”

“ Nothing in this Act may be construed to subject the pregnant mother upon whom any abortion is performed or attempted to any criminal conviction and penalty.
Section 5. That chapter 22-17 be amended by adding thereto a NEW SECTION to read as follows: Terms used in this Act mean: (1) "Pregnant," the human female reproductive condition, of having a living unborn human being within her body throughout the entire embryonic and fetal ages of the unborn child from fertilization to full gestation and child birth ”

“ The number of the offspring is greatly reduced. The ovum of the female and the sperm of the male become microscopic. The germ of life remains within the body of the mother until it has reached that stage of development which fits it for its independent life in the outer world. The pe [Pg 80] riod from conception to birth is greatly prolonged, and the periods of deliverance from the necessity of the reproductive act are alike extended. The higher in the scale the more dependent the offspring, until in the instance of man the offspring is the most helpless and dependent of all. ”

“ But this they will not do; they must have assurance doubly sure; they must have the written word of the child itself as soon as it is born, giving the parents indemnity from all responsibility on the score of its birth, and asserting its own pre-existence. They have therefore devised something which they call a birth formula—a document which varies in words according to the caution of parents, but is much the same practically in all cases ”

“ By rendering easily possible a selection in parentage and the choice of the right time and circumstances for conception it is, again, the chief key to the eugenic improvement of the race. There are many other benefits, as is now generally becoming clear, which will be derived from the rightly applied practice of birth-control. To many of us it is not the least of these that birth-control effects finally the complete liberation of the spiritual object of marriage. ”

“ By superfœtation is meant the conception, by a woman already pregnant, of a second embryo, resulting in the birth of two children at the same time, differing much in their degree of maturity, or in two separate births, with a considerable interval between. ”

“ To make the distinction, one ought to be familiar with an individual from birth, and to have some knowledge of the conditions to which he was exposed, in the period between conception and birth,—for of course a modification which takes place during that time is as truly an acquired character as one that takes place after parturition. ”

“ My guess is that, a few years in the future, there will occur the most unique birth ever known to man—a birth in reverse. Some couple, somewhere—perhaps someone we know here in Allertown—will live through the experience of the daughter they never knew reentering the mother's womb and retracing her steps through the embryo stage to the moment of conception. ”

“ By the French code, however, no child that is born alive can inherit, unless it is born viable. As regards infanticide, proof of a conclusive separate existence of the child is demanded before live-birth is admitted. ”

“ Birth Control, in the true meaning of the term, therefore, is seen to consist not of the prohibition or prevention of human offspring, but rather of the governing, regulating, and managing of the production of human offspring, under the inspiration of the highest ideals and under the direction of the highest reason, for the purpose of the advancement and welfare of the race and that of the individuals composing the race. ”

“ THE PLACENTAL STAGE.—Although the third stage is chiefly concerned with the separation and the delivery of the after-birth, on which account it is known as the placental period, the description of other no less remarkable events belongs here. Even after the infant is born the umbilical cord extends from its navel to the placenta, just as it has done throughout pregnancy. Among larger mammals separation of the new-born from the mother is brought about in one of two ways; sometimes the activity of the young breaks the navel-string, though more frequently the mother bites it in two. ”

“ It will be convenient first to review the more serious arguments used against Birth Control, the problem being considered throughout both as a world-problem and as one with a special significance for this country. ”

“ It is evident, however, that the other conditions will not remain equal, for no evidence has yet been brought forward to show that birth-control, even when practised without regard to eugenic considerations—doubtless the usual rule up to the present—has produced any degeneration of the race. ”

“ As the average duration of a woman's fecundity is about twenty-five years, and as the mean duration of pregnancy and lactation is eighteen months, it follows that a healthy woman can give birth to sixteen children, but examples are not wanting in which, in consequence of plural births or of prolonged periods of fecundity, as many as twenty-four children have resulted from a single marriage. ”

“ A declaration signed by some person who, if the child had been born alive, would have been required to give information concerning its birth, to the effect that no registered medical practitioner was present at the birth, or that his certificate cannot be obtained, and that the child was not born alive ”

“ Now we all admit it is right to control the process of childbirth, and to save the mother as much pain as possible. It is no more unnatural to control conception by artificial means than to control childbirth by artificial means. ”

“ But the evils of excessive birth control are very real. There is first the individual—every woman is better in body and mind for child bearing—the periodic completion of the maternal cycle brings out the best, preserves youth and maintains vital contact with life. Maternity gives to woman her most beautiful attributes. ”

“ Duty of Nurse Immediately Following Birth of Child.—As soon as the child is born the nurse should sit by the side of the mother and hold the womb until the after-birth is expelled. The womb can be easily felt in the lower part of the woman's abdomen as a hard mass. ”

“ The disturbance of uterine existence between conception and birth is that which has engaged most attention, and the fact that such disturbances can take place requires that the expectant mother should be protected from anything that can so act on her own organism as to prevent the due operation of the law of heredity. ”

“ The average number of procreative years of married life was 16.1, the age of fifty years being considered in this study as the end of the procreative period for the seventy-two women who were older than that. ”

“ Conception Soon After a Preceding Pregnancy.—Conception sometimes follows birth (or abortion) with astonishing rapidity, and some women seem for a period of their lives either always pregnant or with infants at their breasts. This prolificity is often alluded to, and is not confined to the lower classes, as often stated, but is common even among the nobility. Illustrative of this, we have examples in some of the reigning families in Europe to-day. A peculiar instance is given by Sparkman in which a woman conceived just forty hours after abortion. ”

“ Paragraph 8 - If the infant was born after an eight-month pregnancy or after a pregnancy which may be either seven or eight months and he does not have grown hair or nails, it is forbidden to carry him. ”

“ That the birth of a male baby was regarded as an event of far greater importance than that of a female, appears from Leviticus XII, where it is said, that a woman, giving birth to a son, was regarded unclean for only seven days and must not touch hallowed things nor come into the sanctuary for a period of thirty-three days. ”

“ Düsing, examining the records of the lying-in hospitals of Leipzig, 425Dresden and Jena and thus obtaining a very large number of instances whereon to base his conclusions, confirmed the view that elderly primiparæ give birth to an excess of boys, and further that the older they are the larger the excess of male births. ”